Tournament
by Encursio
Summary: Oympia and Tom had been through hell and back together. From being abducted as kids and being taken into the SPARTAN program, they were trained to be heartless and fine tuned killing machines. However keeping your humanity and your feelings intact while getting chosen for this year's Hunger Games will be no easy task. Even if they're together there will be no guarantee of survival.


**Prologue**

"What's the status on S-023." ( S standing for Spartan) asked Dr. Sing, It was a thunderstorming night at an undisclosed location in district 13. The jarring lighting threw shadows all over the walls, through the one way mirror of which he was standing behind he could make out shadowed figures lying motionless on hospital beds. It was almost time to take a body count,

" His body fought completely against the serum, his heart practically exploded. This batch was a bad one, there might be a lack of participants this time around."

Sing sighed and turned to his colleague.

" Where did you find this decrepit lot."

said Sing shaking his head. The capital would be more than just unhappy if they failed to deliver the entertainment this time around for the Hunger Games. Dr. Sing had no interest in the games, but was overjoyed at having live action test and observing carefully the trial. Always making it more potent, more powerful, longer lasting, but always more more more. All the headaches would be worth it in the end, He had his predictions for who would win but kept it to himself, then what would the fun be? He oversaw everything, from seeing this first come in, so weak and fragile, into the strong warriors that are bred during training. He looked back to the beds and smiled to himself, he could already see the broken bones and the broken spirits that would come in time.

" Excuse me Dr. Sing."

another colleague entered the room and brought him back to the present. " Sir, reporting in to tell you that S-020's vitals just failed, she fell asleep and never woke up." she peered through the glass into the dark room to the motionless bodies, wrote something down on her clipboard and left. _Ah the girl from district 3 didn't make it, shame I had higher hopes for her._ He heard a blip behind him and turned to the monitors behind him. Of the 24 subjects taken into this batch only eight survived of the original 24. The blip was an update from the lab upstairs where the vitals of all the subjects were being monitored, His eyebrows raised in surprise and he turned back to the mirror and smiled. _Oh this one's going to be a fighter, according to protocol she should be terminated. But why not throw a bit of a wildcard in this year's Hunger Games._ Dr. Sing and his colleague left the room. The notification remained up on the screen. _NOTICE: S-020 Olympia Vale's vitals have come back online._

" VALE GET THE FUCK OVER THE WALL, NOW."

The Drill Sergeant screamed from the side of the obstacle course. The next couple of weeks after they got the evaluated from the med bay had been hell. The Drill Sergeant made sure of that, Olympia had been evaluated with a bad heart after her near death at the lab. The whole thing was treated as an experiment by Dr. Sing, as he recommended that too much money was already sunk into her. Even the Drill Sergeant knew however this was just to see how much punishment she could take before her heart gave out. He heard a curse and a splash as he saw Olympia drop down,down,down. Time seemed to slow down as she fell, He saw Tom try desperately to snatch her hand but it was too late. He quickly scanned behind him to make sure there was a team of O.D.S.T. security behind him, Spartans during the early phases tended to be… problematic.

" VALE GET OVER HERE RIGHT NOW."

As he pointed to her and a security team came to drag her from the mud to him and forced her to look at him.

" DID YOU NOT HEAR ME, DID THEY EVALUATE YOU WITH BAD HEARING TOO?" as he shouted directly in front of her with the other squads going about the course he knew he had struck one of her most sensitive spots, her pride.

" GET OVER TO THE START AND RERUN THE WHOLE COURSE, NOW!"

He saw as he shouted that she wanted to cry, that she wanted to punch him, he saw from the savage look on her face that she was using every amount of mental strength not to lash out.

" Let her go, Now Vale. You will complete it completely without fault or you whole squad will get reduced rations for a week."

He had the security team release her and as she stood there seething she turned and started taking a step to walk away, however this wasn't enough. The Drill Sergeant smiled cruelly and then kicked her in the small of the back and sent her sprawling onto the dirt.

" WHY ARE YOU WALKING, DID I SAY GO AHEAD AND JUST STROLL THROUGH THE COURSE?"

He watched her shake on the ground with fury and he smiled, he knew what was going to happen next. Olympia jumped up with a scream of fury and immediately charged the drill sergeant with her fist raised. Before she could take 3 steps she was tackled by the O.D.S.T. security team, and began to beat her. Although Spartans even in their early teen years had the strength of two fully trained O.D.S.T.'S resisting only made it worse. The Drill Sergeant walked over and looked over one of the shoulders of the security personnel as they kicked and punched Olympia. Although she was in fetal position covering her vitals she would refuse to cry out.

 _She's going to make quite the competitor, her along with Tom from district three seem to watch out for each other. Shame that she's going to have hospitalized now._

The Drill Sergeant stood up and looked at the sky.

 _Hmm, the days still very young_ he thought and walked back over to the course to watch the other squads. He left the case of pure determination and raging spirit behind him.

" Tom… Do you think this is some sort of sick joke?"

Olympia started wide eyed and unbelievingly at the sheet of paper posted in the front of the building. As she stared at the sheet of paper a cold hand seemed to wrap around her whole body. For the Hunger Games Tournament two people were selected from each squad and put into color coded teams for the tournament. Olympia had dropped her gaze but now returned it back to the notice board.

 _ **Notice: These will be the teams for representing their squad in this year's Hunger games.**_

 _ **Spartans picked from each squad**_

 _ **Wolf:**_ __

 _ **SPARTAN-010: Naomi**_

 _ **SPARTAN-008: Li**_

 _ **OSiris:**_

 _ **SPARTAN-020 Olympia**_

 _ **SPARTAN-026 Tom**_

 _ **Katana:**_

 _ **SPARTAN-051: Kurt**_

 _ **SPARTAN-052: Jorge**_

 _ **Gladius:**_

 _ **SPARTAN-079: Arthur**_

 _ **SPARTAN-087: Kelly**_

She couldn't read it anymore, she felt sick to her stomach. There were a total of 6 teams and 12 death sentences. While the rest of the Spartans would be handed out job duties they would fight would fight to the death for entertainment of the rest of the districts and the capital.

" Let's go inside Olly, come on I've got you."

Tom said as he laid a steadying hand on her shoulder and led her inside the building.

"Thanks Tom… I just can't believe it…" Olympia said weakly, she wanted to cry and shout. She was angry at the world, at the district, at the capital. How they managed to keep up such a sadistic game was beyond her comprehension. As Tom led her through the white washed walls of the building where they were to graduate as Spartans she noticed the rows of pictures on the wall. Every winner of every Hunger Games had their picture on there, no one knew what was they won. Rumors circulated from they were released to live their own live, the victors were drafted into a super elite black ops squad sent after the capitals enemies, all the way to they were simply put to sleep into cryo tubes as a way of controlling them. She weakly gazed at all the pictures relying on Tom to keep her steady. She noticed that the picture of the most recent winners of the Hunger Games was gone. There were rumors that a full team of two had won and defied the capital, however they disappeared and the capital quickly swept it under a rug. Some of the other Spartans had talked about the possibilities of that and two names seemed to always come up.

 _Peeta and Katniss…._

She looked up at Tom and smiled, Tom's been her anchor throughout the hellish story that is her life. They've been through so much together and his demeanor always kept her grounded and hopeful. Tom noticed that she was looking at him and and looked down at her and smiled still leading her down the hall.

"Listen… Olly, whatever happens whatever we go through, Just know that I'll always be there for you and we can do this. I guess this will settle the fights we have over who's squads the best huh?"

He smiled at her and laughed. The way he held her gaze with those steady green eyes gave her infinite amount of reassurance. The way he laughed gave her hope, she turned her look back the doors leading to the ceremony and righted herself.

" Tom… no matter what, we're in this together and I promise we'll make it out somehow."

He looked at her and smiled, that warm smile that got her through all these years.

" Sounds like a deal Olly, just try and keep up. Now let's graduate together. As Spartans." He smiled at her with his eyes. And together they entered the grand room of the graduation chamber and disappeared between the masses.

 **NOW LET THE GAMES BEGIN, AND MAY THE ODDS EVER BE IN YOUR FAVOR**

The loud speakers boomed and Olympia felt her adrenaline spike as the doors opened slowly. The crack of light getting larger and larger, She was getting a headache that seemed to split right through her helmet. She checked her weapon, they handed standard issue magnums with one round. Normally this wouldn't have been a problem for her suits shields to absorb but while in the arena they were deactivated. This one round meant death. It was ready and loaded, she wasn't however as seeing the crack of light slowly getting bigger and bigger was making her heart seem to beat thunderously in her chest. She could hear blood rushing in her eyes and her vision seemed to get fuzzy. She grabbed her chest right over her heart, she felt as if she was slipping into something she knew she wouldn't get out of. Then she suddenly felt a hand quickly grab her shoulder and shake her back into reality.

" Olly! Stay with me, It's about to start I'll need you by my side every step of the way. I can't do this without you Olly, I never could do any of it without you… Out there I'll protect you no matter the cost, even at the pain of death. I know that if we work side by side there won't be any need for that. I know that being with you every step of the way… nothing can stop us. Nothing can stop **US."**

That single word broke through her fog and she looked up at him, he changed his vision configuration so she could see her his eyes. She knew instantly that he meant every word of it, and he was right. She looked back at the door as they had almost fully opened. She took one more look into Tom's eyes before he turned the visor back into reflective mode and they both turned to face the doors. The blinding light gleamed off their armor as it opened and they could already hear gunfire erupting at different points in the arena.

" GO GO GO ALWAYS STICK TO ME." yelled Tom in a fierce voice as he turned the safety off on his magnum.

The duo launched themselves through the light at full speed. Delving right into the heart of chaos and uncertainty.


End file.
